Diary of a Stay-at-home Mom, motherhood and beyond

Shelf Life February 3, 2009

Do you ever look in the mirror and your ass reveals a side of itself you’ve never seen before?

The side that seems to resist all the countless lunges, running and working out you’ve been doing.

I eat healthy, exercise daily and have always been a healthy weigh, my college weight (proudly even after 2 kids), fluctuating between 5 lbs and 2 sizes.

But why as women are we so hard on ourselves?

Why do we let what we see on the scale dictate how we feel on the inside? And do we ever truly see in the mirror what we look like on the outside?

In a world of emphasis on size 2, 24″ waist, C breasts, and losing the baby weight before you’ve left the hospital, our conception of healthy has fallen into the hands of the media. The same media, that calls beautiful Jessica Simpson, Fat, follows around celebrity mothers minutes after giving birth and declaring they have hit their pre-baby weight just minutes after pushing out a 9 lber, and the same media that declares that beautiful, healthy athletic women, like Serena Williams are fat and manly.

No wonder so many woman have body dismorfia. No wonder a healthy size 8, 10 or even 12 woman thinks her legs have to be thinner, butt smaller and waist trimmer.

My sister, a long distance runner, suffered from anorexia for many years, still does, a disorder bought on by many issues. But during the onset, as a Sophmore in high school, was told by a reporter at a track meet. That she didn’t look like a long distance runner, she was bigger than the runner she beat. Bigger at probably around the 120 range and 5’5″. Even now at the same weight, even months after bearing a child, she still believe she isn’t small enough, trim enough and beautiful enough. Who knows what she thinks of my frame, at 5’9″ and 25 lbs heavier than herself?

How do we teach our children that healthy is whats in? Eat well be active and love yourself. As a mother, I believe it is my role to teach my kids, my daughter especially that all body types are different and all body types are beautiful. In the world of childhood obesity on the rise, a mother on the popular hit show Weeds, replacing her 10 year old daughters choclate stach with laxatives, a relative of mine, expressing to her 7 year old daughter that if she keeps up her eating habits, she will find herself on Jenny Craig, we’ve got a lot to filter.

I believe, although we are not fully in control, a healthy image starts from your parents. Give you kids the tools to see who they truly are and hopefully they will see they are 10 times better than a doctored image on the cover of any magazine or a celebrity whose frame is fading in front of your eyes.

Eat an apple a day, turn off the TV, put down the remote and enjoy the sunshine.

Live in or visiting the South Jersey/Philadelphia Area?
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